Tuesday, June 09, 2015

In Exodus 32 when the people of Israel became afraid that they would not make it out of the desert alive, afraid that God had abandoned them, they asked Aaron to make them an idol. An in 32:4 he said, in effect, “Bring me what you have,” and he took the jewelry they brought and made a golden calf. That made me think of Matthew 14, the story of when Jesus fed the 5,000. When the disciples were afraid because they did not know how they would feed this huge crowd, Jesus told them, in effect, "Bring me what you have." He then turned five loaves and two fish into enough for over 5000 people to have supper. It hit me that when we are afraid or overwhelmed we have a choice: we can bring God what we have and He will make it more than enough, or we can try and manipulate what we have and hang onto it and it becomes even less. In the hands of the King “what we have” becomes a blessing; in our hands “what we have” becomes an idol.